It is as if by submerging yourself in a horror story, you will be unmade, but you can also re-emerge, different than before, if you choose. The overused adage is true: we imagine horrors in order to cope with real ones.

Bonnie Chau reflects on being Asian-American, the ideas and motivations of representation and visibility, the Amanda Gorman translation debate, and translating out of whiteness.

“The universe has been listening to my conversations, threading everything together. It began last April, when I picked up ​Swann’s Way ​for the third time in ten years.”

As we moved through the “Know Thyself” syllabus, I grappled to articulate the elements that went into knowing myself. I hammered away at myself like an interrogator.

"What do I do when I need solace? When I lose the sense of wonder I can only get by physically being with the people I love, experiencing the places I love, and everything in between? I do what I’ve always done: I write about family.

I have stopped dressing to be seen; I dress for walking. I cropped my hair and allowed it to go salt and pepper. With the mask and the hair and the tennis shoes, I am unrecognizable, sometimes even to myself.